The St. Paul Port Authority has partnered with United Properties to tear down and eventually replace the current home of the St. Paul Saints, which will likely be replaced by a 190,000-square-foot office-warehouse building.

“It’s a pretty big deal,” Port Authority spokesman Tom Collins said. “It’s a 12-acre site. When the Saints move downtown, we’re going to demolish it and redevelop it, and United Properties is our partner in this effort. We have two years to market it.”

Made up of United Properties and the Port Authority’s subsidiary Capital City Properties, the joint venture will be called MVP Real Estate.

The 6,000-seat stadium opened in 1982, and officials hope to use the 12.8 acres for something more in keeping with Energy Park Drive’s existing business center. The Port Authority plans to receive the title to the land next year and complete demolition and site cleanup by mid-2015.

Brandon Champeau, assistant vice president of development with United Properties, said his company now envisions a 190,000- to 200,000-square-foot building spanning 2 acres.

The building, which could open in fall 2016, would likely have four to six tenants leasing space, offering a total of 200 to 300 jobs.

“The market is ripe. UP is ready. We’re ready,” Hilleman said.

Construction of the “flex” office and warehouse building that could accommodate light manufacturing and commercial tenants would begin next year. United Properties, which formed in 1916 to manage the assets of Hamm’s Brewing Co., will celebrate its centennial birthday around the time tenants arrive.

The joint partnership gives United Properties access to the land that Midway Stadium sits on — a $3 million value. United Properties will invest $2.5 million in cash in building construction, on top of a $9 million bank loan the company would secure.

United Properties would put in another $541,000 in services such as building design and marketing. Profits from lease revenue would be split evenly between the Port Authority’s subsidiary and United Properties.

“We supply the land. They supply the equity,” said Lee Krueger, a Port Authority real estate and development official. “Instead of them paying us for the land, we get paid through cash flow during the tenure of the joint venture.”

The joint partnership is considered a long-term arrangement with no specified end date, though the parties have the right to buy each other out.

This is the Port Authority’s fifth joint venture project, with the latest being the Interstate Partners building by the Beacon Bluff Business Center and the old 3M campus.

Since the 1970s, the Port Authority has converted 214 acres of former Superfund land along Energy Park Drive between Snelling Avenue and Lexington Parkway into the 25-building Energy Park Business Center.

The land has mostly been sold to private developers for office and light-industrial buildings, as well as townhomes, condominiums and apartments. The Port Authority retains “a couple remnants,” said Monte Hilleman, a real estate and redevelopment manager with the agency.

The Port Authority’s Energy Park Utility Co. heats and cools the 2 million square feet of office and industrial space throughout the business center. The utility, established in the 1980s after the national energy crisis, was recently upgraded from a two-pipe to a four-pipe system, allowing heating and cooling to be individualized for different buildings.

“Everybody was either heating or everybody was cooling,” Hilleman said. “Now, they can pick and choose.”

The Saints, who have played at Midway Stadium since the early 1990s, will move into a new 7,000-seat ballpark in 2015. The ballpark is being constructed by the city of St. Paul off Fifth and Broadway streets in Lowertown.

The decision to partner with United Properties was approved Tuesday at a Port Authority board of commissioners meeting. The company, which maintains headquarters in Bloomington and Denver, has been owned by the Pohlad family since 1998.

Frederick Melo came to the Pioneer Press in 2005 and brings an aggressive East Coast attitude to St. Paul beat reporting. He spent nearly six years covering crime in the Dakota County courts before switching focus to the St. Paul mayor's office, city council, and all things neighborhood-related, from the city's churches to its parks and light rail. A resident of Hamline-Midway, he is married to a Frogtown woman. He Tweets manically at @FrederickMelo

As you comment, please be respectful of other commenters and other viewpoints. Our goal with article comments is to provide a space for civil, informative and constructive conversations. We reserve the right to remove any comment we deem to be defamatory, rude, insulting to others, hateful, off-topic or reckless to the community. See our full terms of use here.

More in News

St. Paul Public Schools has established a where anyone can donate money to pay off anonymous students’ overdue lunch accounts. The district said it’s a response to a social media campaign that caused many people to call the district asking how they can give. Families in the district owe nearly $28,000 on school lunches. All district schools provide free breakfasts and most offer...

Weekend snow is on tap for much of southern Minnesota and western Wisconsin, with 3 to 6 inches expected in the Twin Cities and more elsewhere. The snow will be followed next week by the season’s first subzero temperatures. According to the National Weather Service, a slow-moving low pressure system will spread snow into western Minnesota on Saturday morning and...

Hennepin County Medical Center in downtown Minneapolis is planning to reduce its workforce by as much as 4 percent next year. The hospital plans to eliminate up to 275 full-time positions to balance the budget and keep the opening of a $220 million ambulatory and outpatient surgery center on schedule for 2018, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported. The hospital’s workforce...

Two construction companies have agreed to pay a combined $147,500 in fines over safety violations in the death of one worker and injuries to another during construction of the Minnesota Vikings’ new stadium in downtown Minneapolis last year. Berwald Roofing is paying $113,200 for three violations, while Mortenson is paying $34,300 for one violation. The penalties are lower than Minnesota’s...

Larry Stanger, the Inver Grove Heights police chief who has been on paid leave since April while being investigated for alleged wrongdoing, will resign as part of a separation agreement reached between him and the city. The city council is scheduled to consider approving the agreement at its regularly scheduled meeting Monday. City Administrator Joe Lynch and City Attorney Tim...

St. Paul police are investigating a case of possible embezzlement at Town and Country Club. Police were notified of the matter on Monday and an investigator met with representatives of the club, said Steve Linders, a St. Paul police spokesman. A brief police report indicates the incident of possible embezzlement began in January 2010 and ended Dec. 2. Police are...